


Saudade

by andabatae



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: 69 (Sex Position), Alternate Universe - Mob, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Blow Jobs, Crying, Devoted Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren, Established Relationship, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Grief/Mourning, HEA, HEA Guaranteed, Heavy Angst, Non-Linear Narrative, Smut, Vaginal Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-30
Updated: 2020-03-30
Packaged: 2021-02-28 16:54:03
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,147
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23400409
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/andabatae/pseuds/andabatae
Summary: Rey toyed with the strings of the oversized black hoodie she was wearing. She wore the hoodie every night, wrapping the soft fabric around her body and pretending it was his arms, instead. It was her secret, the proof that even though life had moved on, her heart never would.Ben Solo was the love of her life. She’d known it from the moment she’d first taken his hand.And exactly one year ago, he’d died.
Relationships: Kylo Ren/Rey, Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 120
Kudos: 474
Collections: The Perfect Date - Pink Ladies Spring Exchange, “Why does this author not have a book deal” collection





	Saudade

**Author's Note:**

  * For [JustYouBenSolo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/JustYouBenSolo/gifts).



> The prompt was the song ["Hoodie" by Hey Violet](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GNtIvGrqAZE). I don't know how you feel about angst, Josie, but you gave me some pretty angsty songs, soooooo... enjoy??
> 
> saudade - the feeling of longing for something or someone that you love which is lost.

Rey stood at the window, looking out at the rain. Sheets of it fell from the sky, smudging the world into an Impressionistic painting. Pissarro’s "The Boulevard Montmartre at Night," maybe, with the dots of headlights watery-bright and every street lamp reflected twice on the pavement.

Her eyes blurred with tears. She’d never cared about art before. That was _his_ thing.

She lifted her wineglass to her lips and took a deep swig, then turned away from the window. Unfortunately, that didn’t help her stop thinking about Ben. One entire wall of her studio apartment was a shrine to him. Photos of him, of _them_ —laughing, cuddling, having adventures. They’d crammed a lifetime of memories into one year.

And then it had ended.

Rey sat on her bed under the photos. She toyed with the strings of the oversized black hoodie she was wearing as she gazed sightlessly towards the damp night. She wore the hoodie every night, wrapping the soft fabric around her body and pretending it was his arms, instead. It was her secret, the proof that even though life had moved on, her heart never would.

Ben Solo was the love of her life. She’d known it from the moment she’d first taken his hand.

And exactly one year ago, he’d died.

\-----

“Who is that?” Rey asked, elbowing Poe in the ribs.

They were in his backyard for his annual Fourth of July barbecue, and the smell of roasting meat wafted through the humid air. She was sweaty and pleasantly buzzed, feeling rather patriotic in her Union Jack tank top and cutoff jean shorts.

“Who?” Poe asked, tossing the beanbag he was holding towards a sloped board with a hole cut in it. This odd pastime was apparently called “cornhole.” Over the course of her last two years studying in the US, Rey had been treated to a bewildering array of oddly named games and funny American traditions.

“The hot one.”

At that, Poe looked up. He squinted. “Finn? You know Finn.”

Rey rolled her eyes. “Obviously I know Finn, but I wasn’t talking about your boyfriend. The sexy giant. The one wearing black.”

“Oh.” Poe laughed. “That’s Ben Solo. Our parents are close, so he’s like a cousin to me.” He eyed Rey consideringly. “You know, I wouldn’t have thought to pair you two up, but it might actually be perfect.”

“Really?” Rey asked, intrigued.

“Yeah. He’s a pretentious, arty type—likes to read books and discuss paintings. Goes to museums for fun. Cooks ridiculously elaborate meals.”

“I like food.”

“Yeah, dude, I know.” Poe shook his head. “You’re on, what, your third hot dog?”

“Fourth.” Rey waved her paper plate triumphantly.

“Anyway, he can be a bit serious, but he’s really fucking smart. He could use someone who makes him laugh.”

“So he’s smart and a good cook, and I’m funny and like to eat?”

“Precisely.” Poe grabbed her hand, then started dragging her towards Ben.

Rey struggled to hang on to her plate and the half-eaten hot dog, which she refused to let go to waste. Her heart hammered, and her palms were getting sweaty.

Ben was leaning against the side of the house, brows furrowed as he watched Rose and Finn play a chaotic game of badminton. His muscled arms were crossed over his wide chest, and his black T-shirt looked like it was having a hard time containing him. Unlike everyone else, he was wearing jeans and sexy black motorcycle boots. He must be burning up in that outfit, but he looked totally unbothered by the heat.

As they approached, his head turned to look at them, and his eyes widened. He straightened off the wall and ran a hand through his longish black hair. Was he… primping? He shifted from foot to foot as they approached, chewing on his lip as he stared at Rey.

When they reached him, Poe launched into some long-winded story about how he knew each of them, but Rey was too mesmerized by Ben to hear a word of it. His eyes were honey-brown and intense, the irises ringed by a darker circle. She could feel herself falling into them. He seemed just as captivated as she was, and the outside world faded away as they just stared and stared and stared.

“Uh, guys?” Poe’s voice broke into the silence, snapping Rey out of her hot man-induced hypnosis.

“Right.” She grinned and stuck out her hand. “I’m Rey. Nice to meet you.”

“Ben,” he said in a voice like midnight. His hand engulfed hers, and that was it, Rey was done for.

\-----

There was a hole in his hoodie, a cigarette burn from Ben’s self-admitted “poor choices phase.” Rey worried it with her fingers, feeling the hardened edges where the fabric had melted. Soft with a bit of a bite; that was Ben in a nutshell.

Rey wrapped her arms around her bent legs and rested her chin on her knees. Her glass of wine was empty now, sitting on her nightstand. Rey had wanted to be drunk tonight, but not too drunk. Tonight was about remembrance; this was her church, and the lingering tartness on her tongue was the remnant of Holy Communion. 

Candles flickered on the windowsill, casting a warm glow over Rey’s possessions. She hadn’t owned much before Ben came into her life, and he’d delighted in giving her little things. Small tokens of his affection. The calligraphy pens she still hadn’t used, an abalone hair clip, a whittled bird. On the edge of her desk was a picture frame. The photo in it had been taken by Poe at another one of his barbecues three months after she and Ben had started dating. She was laughing in his arms, legs wrapped around his waist as he held her close and whispered something in her ear. She could still feel that fall of soft, dark hair against her cheek, but for the life of her, she couldn’t remember what he’d said.

Sometimes she was worried she would forget his voice entirely. It was already fading in her mind, blurring like too many other memories. If she could preserve it all in amber, every precious second of Ben Solo, she would.

There was one thing, though, that always helped her remember. She grabbed her teddy bear, the one with a heart on its paw and a very special message inside. She’d sobbed as she’d brought the recording into the Build A Bear workshop, wishing she’d saved all his voicemails, that she hadn’t blithely assumed his voice would be around forever.

She squeezed its paw, and the recording started to play.

“Hey, babe, it’s me. I’m calling to say I’ll be a little late. Dad says he has something important to tell me, so I’m heading to the house. You know how he is. Always some drama. Anyway, I’ll hopefully be done soon. I can’t wait to see you.” A soft sigh. "Can you believe our one-year anniversary is tomorrow? It’s fucking nuts. I’m the luckiest guy in the world.” She could hear the smile in his voice. “You’re my world, angel. I love you, and I’ll see you soon.”

Rey wept as she held the bear to her chest. Its fur was matted and worn from how often she’d done this over the last year. She slept with it every night, just like she wore his hoodie. They were the only pieces of him she had left.

This room wasn’t just a church; it was a museum. Ben hung on her walls and cluttered her desk. He filled her arms when she slept. His voice whispered in her ear night after night, always the same. _I love you, and I’ll see you soon._

She’d never seen him again. Not even to identify the body; there wasn’t enough of that left to identify. Just fragments of scorched bone, the remnants of a father and son who had burned to death side-by-side in their family home.

In exactly twenty-three minutes, it would be the one year anniversary of that weeping phone call she’d gotten from Leia, who had been at the grocery store when the fire had happened. An hour and sixteen minutes after that, it would be midnight. The start of her two-year anniversary with Ben.

Tonight, she would mourn. Tomorrow, she would take a picture of him to all their favorite places: the museum, Maz’s Cantina, the park lined with blossoming cherry trees.

The date they’d never gotten to have.

\-----

Rey laughed as she clung to Ben’s waist. Air rushed past them as he steered his motorcycle through traffic. He was confident but not overly aggressive; it was like the bike was an extension of his strong body. She’d been scared the first time he’d tossed her a helmet and told her to hop on, but now she had no fear. She was safe with him.

He pulled up outside Maz’s Cantina and parked. Rey hopped off the bike and tugged off her helmet. Ben did the same, revealing wildly mussed hair. He ran his fingers through it, but that only made the situation worse.

“Here, let me,” she said, giggling as she stood on tiptoes and combed her fingers through the dark locks. When it was back in relative order, she stayed on tiptoe, cupping his cheeks in her hands. She kissed him softly. He wrapped his arms around her, leather jacket creaking as he held her close. Their mouths moved together, merging and parting in a sensual dance that felt as natural as breathing.

Someone on the sidewalk whistled, and Rey broke away with a grin. “Come on,” she said, grabbing his hand. “We’re getting distracted.”

“I want to be distracted,” he grumbled as she dragged him inside the bar. “I haven’t gone down on you since yesterday.”

Her cheeks heated. Six months in, she and Ben were as voracious in bed as ever, and as she’d learned on their third date, Ben was definitely a giver. He adored eating her out, would do it every chance he got.

She slapped his arm lightly. “Don’t distract me. I’m hungry!”

“So am I,” he growled close to her ear, tugging her into his arms. She caught herself against his chest, laughing up at him. Her heart felt light. She’d never known this kind of happiness was possible.

“Lovebirds!” Maz called from behind the bar. “The usual?”

The usual was a spinach salad with chicken, apple, and walnuts for Ben—dressing on the side—and a cheeseburger and fries for Rey. He always drank a whiskey, neat, whereas Rey liked to sample the rotating beers on tap. “You bet,” Rey called out, waving at the diminutive bar owner.

Maz gestured towards their usual booth in the corner. “Have a seat, I’ll bring it out.”

They talked about their days while waiting for the meal. Rey was working part-time in an auto garage while she worked to finish her engineering degree. Ben worked for his mother’s political campaign, which was heating up even though the election was a year away. Leia was up for reelection as governor, and her aggressive stance on reducing corporate corruption had painted a target on her back when it came to conservative politicians and their wealthy benefactors, who despised her attempts to close corporate loopholes. “‘Trickle down’ sounds like what happens when you try to pee in the woods,” Leia had famously told Rey on their first meeting. “It isn’t a reasonable economic practice.”

When the food came, Rey tucked in eagerly. Ben ate slowly, almost daintily, something she never ceased to find funny. He looked like a badass in his black motorcycle gear, all brooding good looks and straining muscles, but he had the soul of a poet and the palate of a gourmet.

“I found a piece of art that reminds me of you,” he told her.

Rey looked up at him, cheeks bulging. “Oh, yeah?” she asked around her mouthful of food.

He winced. “Or at least, it reminds me of you when you’re not eating.”

She kicked him lightly under the table. “Please. I’m beauty incarnate like this.”

He chuckled as he pulled out his phone. “Strangely, I don’t disagree. All right, here it is.” He pulled up a brilliantly colored image that showed the sun setting—or rising?—over the sea. The rays were geometric, the yellow shot through with red and blue, and a strip of green coastline sat between rocky outcrops in the center of the painting.

Rey blinked. It was a pretty image—almost blinding to look at, even though it was just pigments causing that effect—but what did it have to do with her? “It’s beautiful,” she said. “Who did it?”

“It’s ‘The Sun’ by Edvard Munch.”

Because of Ben, she now knew that was the guy who’d painted that screaming picture. She liked this one a lot better. “Why did it make you think of me?”

Ben grinned, showing his charmingly snaggled teeth. He looked so sweet when he smiled, cheeks creasing and eyes squinting, and it made her feel like the world and everything in it were new and bright and magical. “That _is_ you, Rey. You’re my sun. The moment I saw you, it was like my world exploded into color for the first time. Like I was warm after years spent cold and alone. You know what I mean?”

Rey’s eyes blurred with tears. She did understand. Here in this grimy bar, with ketchup smeared over the table and a jukebox playing some odd, upbeat tune involving way too many saxophones, Ben had seized something precious from the air itself and given it to her.

“I know what you mean," she said. "And I love you, too."

\-----

The anniversary of the phone call that changed Rey’s life came and went. She lit another candle, not knowing what else to do to mark it. She’d imagined having some profound realization when the clock ticked over, or maybe experiencing one of those moments where a loved one sent signs from the beyond, like the smell of roses of the flap of a butterfly’s bright wings outside the window. But time passed as fast and uncaringly as it always did, and when the minute was over, Rey was left feeling hollow.

How could a person etch themselves on your heart so deeply and permanently in such a short amount of time? She’d known Ben for just over a year before he’d passed. In two weeks, he’d have been dead for longer than she’d officially known him. Someday, a time would come when Ben would have been dead for longer than he was alive, and she knew she would be just as gutted then, thirty-three years down the line.

She couldn’t stand it. “Why?” she asked the empty air between sobs.

Why him? Why so young? Why… like that? He’d died in pain, alone except for his father, and for what? Politics and money. Oh, the investigation had never found out who was responsible for the arson that had burned the Solo-Organa family house down, but Rey and Leia knew. Ben had died to protect mob interests and corporate money.

Thankfully, that bastard Snoke had been arrested shortly thereafter, thanks in large part to Leia’s evidence from Han’s smuggling operation, and he’d been sentenced to life in prison just last week. A small amount of justice for the pain the mob boss had caused, but it would never be enough. Snoke had cost Leia the governorship as well as her son. He had cost Rey everything.

The most beautiful person she’d ever met was gone, and he was never coming back.

Midnight came and went. “Happy anniversary, baby,” she whispered. Then she curled up, hoodie wrapped tightly around her shivering frame, and closed her eyes. Her tears soaked into her pillow, each drop penance for a minute lived without him.

Eventually, sleep took her, a gentle tide that carried her to a place warmed by Ben’s smile, where laughter filled the air and her heart was still whole.

\-----

When Rey opened Ben’s apartment door, her smile faded to see him pacing back and forth like a caged tiger. His brow was furrowed, and his hands were clenched at his sides.

“Baby?” she asked, setting down her groceries and crossing to him. “What’s wrong?”

“Fuck,” he swore. “It’s—I just can’t fucking believe it.”

Rey rested a hand on his shoulder. He stopped pacing, but his body shook with contained fury. “What happened?” She’d spoken with him on the phone three hours ago, when they’d made plans to cook dinner together. What had changed? “Please tell me, Ben.”

His shoulders drooped. “Fine.” He let Rey guide him to the couch to sit. She sat next to him, grabbing his hand and stroking it gently.

“Come on,” she coaxed. “Tell me.”

He sighed heavily. “It’s my dad."

Alarm shot through Rey. “Is he okay? Did something happen?”

“No, no, I—” Ben mashed his lips together, looking like he was biting back something nasty. “Please, Rey. I just need to get this out.”

She nodded, letting him know she understood, and kept stroking his hand in silence.

The story fell out of him haltingly. Han Solo had never been the most upstanding of citizens—his stints in juvie had become legend on the campaign trail, the sort of thing shared with a wink and a self-deprecating smile—but he’d supposedly been on the straight and narrow since meeting Leia. His shipping business had expanded, growing more profitable by the day.

Leia had grown suspicious. Why, she couldn’t say. She just knew something felt wrong. The money was growing too quickly, and sometimes Han showed up with fancy new toys that hadn’t been purchased out of their shared account. A new watch, courtside NBA tickets, a motorcycle even faster and more expensive than Ben’s. Being Leia, she hadn’t wanted to start that conversation without proof, so she’d hired a private investigator.

And that was how she'd learned Han was involved in illegal smuggling.

“He lied to us,” Ben said. “He fucking lied! He was bringing in boxes from all over, with God knows what in them, getting paid in cash.”

“Oh my God.” Rey pressed a hand to her mouth. Could it be true? Was Han Solo really that reckless, that uncaring about his family, his safety, his wife’s career?

“You know what’s even shittier?” Ben asked. He tugged on his hair with his free hand, the other still tightly clenching hers. “He’s been working with that local mob boss, Snoke.”

Rey gasped. “The one your mom says is in bed with local politicians?”

“The very same.” He barked out a sound that wasn’t a laugh. “After years of her anti-corruption efforts, she finds out her own fucking husband is part of the problem.” He shook his head. “If the press finds out, her career is done.”

“Has she confronted Han?”

“Yeah.” Ben snorted. “She says he’s sorry, and he’s going to do everything he can to make it up to us. That he’s cutting ties with Snoke. But it isn’t that easy, and we all know it.”

Rey nestled into his side, resting her head on his shoulder. “What do you mean, it isn’t that easy?”

He tipped his head to the side so his cheek pressed against her hair. “You don’t just stop working with the mob. What’s he going to tell them? That he came clean to Mom, their worst enemy?” He swore. “If she gets her hands on his records, she’ll have the information needed to launch a court case. You think Snoke is going to let that slide?”

A chill wormed its way down Rey’s spine. “You think he’ll do something to stop it?”

“I’d count on it.” Ben exhaled, a burst of warm air that ruffled the hair at the top of her head. “She’s still deciding what to do. If she turns in the evidence tying the smuggling to Snoke, Dad might get immunity for testifying, but that paints a target on his back and ruins her chances of reelection. If she doesn’t say anything… does that make her complicit? I don’t know.”

They sat in silence, breathing together. Rey’s mind spun, working through possibilities. Whatever ended up happening, the Organa-Solos’ lives would change forever. “Will she divorce him, do you think?” she finally asked.

Ben made a rude noise. “Who fucking knows. I’m so pissed at him, Rey. He’s pulled enough shit over the years, and he gets away with it because he’s charming and rough around the edges, but this is a fucking crime.”

A terrible thought struck her. She sat upright, eyes wide as she took in Ben’s beloved face. He looked exhausted, with purple circles under his eyes. “Do you think…” She swallowed down a lump in her throat. “If this gets out, if Leia goes to the authorities… are you going to be in danger?”

“No, I don’t think so. I haven’t lived with them for years; I don’t have anything to do with this.” His eyes softened as he looked at her. “Hey, don’t worry. I’ll be okay.”

“You better be,” Rey said. A tear trickled down her cheek, and she punched his shoulder lightly. “Our anniversary is next week, and I refuse to let that be the last one.”

“Hey, hey. It’s all right.” He grabbed her waist and hauled her into his lap, cuddling her close. She breathed in, comforted by the woodsy aroma of his deodorant and the familiar scent of his skin. “I’ll be okay,” he whispered against her hair. “No matter what happens, I’m not leaving you.” He lifted her chin and kissed her. “This will be the first anniversary of many, sweetheart.”

Rey settled into the kiss, letting her lips speak for her. She loved this man past reason. “You’re it for me, Ben Solo,” she said against his mouth.

His smile curved against her lips. “You’re it for me, too.”

\-----

“I think we’ll go to the museum first,” Rey announced to the empty air of her apartment. It was the morning after her vigil in honor of Ben’s memory. Her fingers clenched around a small, glossy photograph. She held it up and smiled, mirroring Ben’s bright grin. It was one of the few straight-on shots he’d let her take of him; he was oddly uncomfortable about his looks, so most of her pictures were taken in profile or when she’d managed to surprise him. “There’s a Klimt exhibit on. I know you’ll like it.”

Maybe it was crazy to talk to a photo, but Rey needed to talk to him somehow. This was the anniversary date that should have happened. It hadn’t happened last year because she’d been too busy weeping and talking to the police, but she’d be damned if she let any more anniversaries pass without him.

She and Ben deserved their day under the cherry trees.

She wore his hoodie out that day, the black fabric draped over a yellow sundress. It hung nearly to her knees, and she had to push the sleeves up so they didn’t dangle past her hands. She probably looked ridiculous, but it felt right. A little piece of Ben to bring with her.

The Klimt paintings were just what she needed. When Ben had first introduced her to the artist’s work, she’d been enraptured by the bright colors and geometric poses. It was like sunshine in physical form.

“Remember when you first showed me this?” she asked, stopping in front of Klimt’s iconic painting, “The Kiss.” A tall man with dark hair was bent over his lover, kissing her rosy cheek, hands cupping her face. Black and white blocks decorated his yellow robe, and flowers dotted her hair.

She remembered the day well. He’d shown her on his laptop, and she’d immediately exclaimed that it looked like them, from the man’s black hair to the height difference. He’d looked at the painting, looked at her, then said, “Huh, you’re right. Let’s recreate it.” Then he’d grabbed her and tipped her head to the side, peppering her face with kisses while she giggled and squirmed.

“It’s the perfect mix of us,” she said now, holding his photo up so he could look at the painting. “You always liked bold, geometric patterns, and I love bright things.” A nearby woman gave her a weird look and walked away, but Rey ignored her. This was her day with Ben, and fuck anyone who said otherwise.

They walked through the gallery together, Rey providing a constant monologue for Ben’s benefit. Maybe he was in Heaven now, listening to every word and smiling.

She hadn’t believed in Heaven until Ben died. She still wasn’t sure she believed in God, and she refused to believe in Hell, but she couldn’t bear a reality where his spirit didn’t linger somewhere. Ben’s Heaven wouldn’t involve clouds and harps, though. It would be long motorcycle rides through the countryside, deep conversations over coffee in the early hours of the morning, an endless gallery of art to wander through. It would be the sound of rain against a window, a soft blanket wrapped around his shoulders, a lazy day with nothing to do but think and dream.

“I wish I could be there with you,” she whispered. She imagined it—them curled up together on a couch while the rain pattered outside, reading books in companionable silence. Steam would wisp up from her mug of tea while she waited for it to cool, and his own mug of coffee would look tiny in his massive hands as he sipped. She’d tease him for drinking it black as his poet’s soul. He’d toss his book aside and tackle her, long fingers digging into her ribs while she shrieked and struggled to get away from him. And then, when the fight had gone out of her, he would lower his head and kiss her. They would twine together on that couch, mouths and bodies fusing, a Mobius strip with no beginning and no end.

She would happily spend forever like that.

\-----

“I wonder, sometimes,” Ben said late one night. They were cuddled together naked, Rey’s head on his chest and his arm curving beneath her.

“What do you wonder?” Rey asked sleepily. She was relaxed and blissful after an amazing orgasm. Ben’s heart thudded under her ear, rhythmic and eternal as the sea.

“Who we would have been in different lives. How we would have found each other.”

“Yeah?” Rey shifted until she was looking at him, chin resting on the hands she’d laced over his chest. “Like, parallel universes? Or reincarnation?”

Ben’s mouth tipped up at the corner. “Either, I suppose. Both.” The back of his head rested on one brawny forearm, and his eyes were lowered to look at her. “It’s just hard to believe, sometimes. That we would find each other. That this would be real.”

A warm, wonderful ache filled Rey’s chest, and she smiled at him. “I know exactly what you mean.”

Her foster mother had told her that soulmates were a lie. There were plenty of people in the world you could end up with; it just mattered which one you met first. After that, it was a matter of negotiation and tolerance. You put up with the person you chose, whether you wanted to or not, because that’s what you’d agreed to do when signing the marriage contract. _“Even if you love them at first,”_ Rey’s foster mother had said while sucking on her cigarette and staring out the window, _“in the end you’re lucky to get a friendship out of it. Most people don’t even get that.”_

Rey had believed it for a long time. And for the most part, her foster mother had been proven right. High school boyfriends had been juvenile, gross, and disappointing, and college guys hadn’t been much better. Everyone was in it for themselves or to get their dick wet. No one actually _saw_ Rey for who she was. No one cared. She’d believed she would eventually settle for a man who liked her well enough, and that would be that.

And then she’d met Ben.

“Sometimes it feels like a fairy tale,” she told him. The words were hard to drag out, even though they’d been together for nearly a year. Emotional honesty was difficult for her; she’d built up a protective shell over the years, and it was hard to strip that back and reveal the vulnerable heart beneath. “I never knew I could feel like this. I never knew I was… worth this, I guess.”

“You’re worth everything,” Ben said vehemently. He stroked her hair, brushing the sweat-dampened strands back from her face. “And I hate that you grew up thinking differently.”

It was hard to shrug with her chin pillowed on his chest, but Rey tried. “It is what it is. The point is… I don’t know what the point is, actually. Just… I’m glad you’re here. That we’re together. I think we would have been together in other lifetimes, too.”

“Yeah?” Ben asked, a grin splitting his face.

Maybe she was falling prey to some Disney Princess Syndrome, romanticizing the concept of the one true love, but Rey didn’t care. Ben felt like home. He felt like the past and the present and the future all rolled up in one. “Yeah,” she said, matching his grin. “And in some parallel universe, I bet you’re some kind of space prince, and I’m the badass commoner you fall in love with. When you decide you want to be with me, it shakes galactic society to its core.”

“In some parallel universe,” he said, “you’re the most beautiful princess in the land, and I’m the knight who has to slay the dragon for you.”

“In some parallel universe,” Rey said, “I’m the dragon, and you’re the knight who falls hopelessly in love with me. Together, we fight the prejudice against interspecies relationships.”

They collapsed into giggles.

The game continued, each scenario more absurd than the last. In Rey’s past life, she was Hatshepsut, and Ben was Senenmut. She was Juliet, and he was Romeo. No, she was Romeo, and he was Juliet, pining away on a balcony. No, that one had a sad ending, so it was right out. Back to the space aliens and an intergalactic war that ended in an arranged marriage peace treaty. They would rule the galaxy side by side, ushering in an era of peace and prosperity.

“Here’s one thing I know,” Ben said when they were all giggled out and entwined again, sinking towards sleep. “No matter what universe we’re in… we’ll have a happy ending.”

Rey’s lips curved against his side.

She believed him.

\-----

A bell tinkled overhead as Rey headed into Maz’s Cantina. It was mostly empty, with only a few lunch patrons. Maz stood behind the bar like she always did in the afternoons, her gray-haired head barely topping it. Rey waved, then called for an IPA and headed to the booth in the corner.

She ignored Maz’s sad eyes when the woman brought her beer over. Maz knew what day this was, just like all of Rey’s friends did. The ten missed calls on her phone were a sign of just how much everyone knew about today. “A cheeseburger,” Rey said, grinning as brightly as she would have if Ben were here. “And a spinach and chicken salad. Dressing on the side.”

Rey propped the battered and bent photo up against the napkin dispenser. “I hope you’re ready to watch me demolish this cheeseburger,” she said. It was easy to imagine him laughing at that, and she pretended the grin in the photo had just bloomed there like a flower. _“Terrible table manners,”_ he’d chide. And then, because for all his seriousness, he was secretly playful, he’d lean in and wink. _“Good thing I like watching you devour some thick meat.”_

Maybe she shouldn’t be thinking about the dirty jokes and raunchy teasing. Some people remembered their loved ones as saints, sacred and untouchable, all earthy humor erased by the inherent dignity of death. But that was what Rey missed about Ben—his touchability. His realness. The funny, messy, ordinary moments. Those individually bright times, when combined together in her memory, had all the beauty of a star-spattered sky.

She sniffled into her IPA. “I miss your pretentious salads,” she told him. “And I still don’t know how you could eat leaves and still be big as a refrigerator.”

 _“How do you eat so many cheeseburgers and look like some kind of elven princess?”_ he’d ask in return. _“It’s like you don’t even know what a calorie is.”_

“You know, I really don’t,” Rey mused, popping a fry into her mouth. “Some kind of energy unit? You would know the answer. You always knew all the answers.” _“My walking encyclopedia,”_ she’d called him once. _“Better than Wikipedia, especially in bed.”_

 _“Is there something I need to know about your internet habits?”_ Ben had asked in response. _“Because if you’re telling me I have competition, I will gladly take that website down. A DDoS attack for the right to my lady’s heart.”_

Poe and Finn and the rest had rarely seen the quick, clever, naughty side of Ben. They’d seen the serious parts, the brooding in corners while wearing black. “A Beat poet in search of the right decade,” Poe had called him once. “Tall, dark, and frowny,” Rose had said. “Seriously, what do you guys talk about? His favorite albums to listen to on vinyl?”

Ben _had_ owned a vinyl collection, but Rey hadn’t shared that fact with Rose. Besides, she’d come to share his opinion about the art form. The sound was richer, mellower. Plus, there was something sacred to the ritual of putting on a record and setting the needle, about the full-bodied crackle of sound bursting with potential. These days, it was too easy to push a button and have whatever you wanted. When Ben put on a record, it required them to slow down for a minute. Linger. Appreciate.

The burger and salad arrived. Rey arranged Ben’s plate in front of his photo so he could see it—”I know how much you love spinach, you freak,” she murmured—then picked up her cheeseburger and took a huge bite. She closed her eyes and hummed, enjoying the savory burst of flavor in her mouth. Beef, cheese, ketchup, onions, and that one pathetic lettuce leaf, like the burger was making a half-hearted attempt at healthiness.

“I haven’t been listening to your records,” Rey confessed to Ben through a mouthful. “I have your record player and collection, but it’s just too hard.”

 _“Oh, come on,”_ he’d respond. _“That’s no reason not to enjoy a classic art form. Records are meant to be played.”_

“I know,” Rey said, setting the burger down. Her eyes were burning with unshed tears. “But I just keep thinking about that last night.”

His photo didn’t answer. It couldn’t, and she was making this whole thing up in her head, anyway. A lonely woman’s pathetic attempt to recreate something that would never exist again.

Her phone buzzed on the table. Poe was calling. Rey stared at the screen. She’d need to talk to him eventually, if only to soothe his worries. But right now, she was on a date with Ben. Klimt and a burger and cherry blossoms—that was what she wanted. Maybe tonight, she’d finally put on that Jimmy Durante record and dance around her studio apartment, pretending she was in Ben’s arms.

The buzzing stopped. Rey forced a smile and looked back at Ben’s beloved face. She’d stared at that photo so many times in the past year that his snaggle-toothed grin was etched on her brain. There was comfort in that. Time went on and memories faded, but somewhere deep inside, her neurons would always sing with the image of him.

“Anyway,” she said, blinking back the tears that wanted to come, “you’re a horrible snob about food, and I’m going to eat this cheeseburger like an animal while making unblinking eye contact. Are you ready?”

 _“How could I be?”_ he’d ask, and then he’d pretend to be distressed while she ate it so aggressively that sauce dripped down her chin. Inevitably, he’d crack and start laughing, and then she would, too, and it would be a glorious, undignified mess.

When Poe had set them up, he’d assumed Ben needed Rey to teach him how to laugh. She’d made him laugh plenty, but that favor had been paid back tenfold. She didn’t think she’d taught him more than she’d learned.

Sauce dripped down Rey’s chin. Ben smiled at her from his photo. The jukebox played the same awful saxophone song that always played when they were here.

Time moved on. Rey did not.

\-----

“All right,” Ben said, planting his hands on his hips. They stood in the living room of his one-bedroom apartment on the thirtieth floor. Outside, the night sky was tinged orange with the reflected glow of the city, the moon peeping through the clouds. A tapestry of electric lights spread below them like a carpet.

“All right what?” Rey asked. They’d eaten a comfortable meal of Chinese takeout and watched a Netflix show, and then Ben had made her stand up and face him. The hardwood floor was cool beneath her bare feet.

“Do you know what today is?” Ben asked seriously.

Rey wracked her brain. “Um… Tuesday?”

He sighed heavily and shook his head. “No, no, no. Rey, my goddess, light of my life… it's the night before the day before our anniversary.”

Rey burst out laughing, doubling over and bracing her hands against her thighs. “Oh my God, that’s not a thing!”

“It is a thing,” he said, stepping closer to her, looking stern and sweet all at once. “If I say it is, it is.”

Rey giggled as she stood back upright. “Dictator,” she accused.

He nodded, still walking towards her. “That’s right. And since we’re in _my_ apartment, you’d better follow my rules.”

“Ooh,” Rey said, wiggling her hips. “I like the sound of that.”

His hands landed on her waist. They were big and warm, and Rey shivered at the touch. Almost a year in, she found him just as arousing as she had the first time they’d had sex.

“Shit,” Ben said.

Rey blinked, taken out of her horny reverie. “What?”

He grinned sheepishly. “I didn’t think this through, I guess. The music was just supposed to start playing.”

“Music?”

“Stay right there,” he ordered, turning and striding towards the sound system and the record player on top. He fiddled with it, adjusting the stick thingy—the _tonearm,_ Rey remembered from one of his delightfully pedantic lectures—and then that lovely sound-without-sound filled the room, the crackling, breathless moments before a song began.

Ben sprinted back to her, then seized her in his arms. “Pretend the last ten seconds didn’t happen,” he ordered.

Rey laughed and wrapped her arms around his neck. “All right.”

A woman’s voice rose over a plucked harp and then a chorus of strings. Ben began to sway as a man started singing.

 _I'll be seeing you in all the old familiar places  
_ _That this heart of mine embraces all day through_

“Mmm.” Rey rested her head against his chest, relaxing into his hold. Ben wasn’t much of a dancer—he’d told her as much on their second date—but this was exactly what Rey wanted. They swayed with the moon looking down, feet shuffling to the slow rhythm. It was like being in a music box, bodies turning in an endless orbit with love at its center. 

Ben tightened his grip on her as the strings soared, one hand spanning almost her entire waist. “I love you, you know,” he murmured against her hair.

Rey nuzzled his chest, nose rubbing over the smooth fabric of his dress shirt. “I love you, too.”

They didn’t speak after that. They just danced.

\-----

“I thought it would never end,” Rey said. “You and me, dancing that last night. I thought we’d do that for the rest of our lives.”

She stood at one end of a path cutting through the park. Cherry trees lined the walkway, their pink petals vibrant against a robin’s egg blue sky. The trees rustled in the breeze, and every once in a while a blossom drifted down to settle on the path.

A few other people were out, but not many, since it was a workday. Rey’s manager at the garage, Plutt, had been hesitant to give her the day off—until she’d threatened to quit.

Maybe Rey would never go back to the garage. Maybe she’d do this every day from now on. Just her and Ben, drifting slowly through the world. Time had to pass somehow before she could see him again; might as well spend it in a dream.

She knew he wouldn’t want that, though. He’d want her to live loudly, experience everything she could. _“Fill your life with joy,”_ she imagined him saying. _“Squeeze every drop out of it. And one day, when it’s over, you can come be with me.”_

She wrapped her arms around herself, hugging his hoodie close. “It’s hard,” she said. “To be the one who goes on.”

_“I know.”_

Rey took a deep breath, inhaling the fresh scent of growing things. A blossom fluttered down to rest on her shoe, and she smiled at it. She picked it up and tucked it behind her ear. “If you were here, I’d braid flowers into your hair,” she said as she started walking down the path. “A whole crown of them. And you’d act all grouchy and try to get them out, but secretly you’d love it.”

The cherry trees were surrounded by other bushes and flowers, a riot of greenery dotted with color. The air was alive with sound—the rustle of leaves, the drone of bees, the sweet chatter of birds. In the distance, children laughed.

Rey stopped beside a bush adorned with lavender flowers. The long clusters of blossoms fountained down, their weight dragging the branches towards the ground. Butterflies flitted around it, alighting on the delicate blooms to sip at the nectar within. She smiled as one settled on the branch nearest her, spreading its iridescent blue wings to absorb the sunlight. Ben probably knew lots of weird facts about butterflies—she’d have to hit Wikipedia to learn a few of them.

The wind lifted her hair. She closed her eyes and tilted her face up to the sun. Days like this made her feel like a lazy cat. If she had a window seat, she’d curl up in it, content to bask in the warmth until the sun sank below the horizon. “You could pet me,” she told Ben. “Put out a bowl of milk.”

 _“Most cats are lactose intolerant,”_ he’d say very seriously. _“How about a bowl of hamburgers?”_

She didn’t remember when she’d picked that cat fact up, but it had definitely come from Ben. He was a font of useless trivia. _“Not so useless to the cat,”_ she imagined him retorting.

She chuckled. “Sometimes I think you’re living in my head,” she told him. “Listening to my thoughts, making jokes. It’s so real, I swear sometimes I can hear you.”

 _“I’ll always be with you,”_ he said in her mind.  
  
“No one’s ever really gone,” she whispered. Not while her heart still beat. Not while she had his image in her hand and his laugh in her head. He was written on her very cells.

While her eyes were closed, another blossom fell directly on her nose. She laughed and shook it off, then opened her eyes.

Ben was walking towards her.

Rey’s heart raced, and her stomach plummeted. Half joy, half despair because it couldn’t be, there was no way, she was imagining things…

“Rey,” he said. He was wearing a black T-shirt and dark jeans with motorcycle boots, like always. He was thinner than she remembered, his hair longer. But when he grinned, his smile matched the picture still clenched in her hand.

Rey sank to her knees on the path, her limbs unable to support her through the shock. She felt lightheaded and dizzy. “Ben?” she croaked.

Boots pounded on the pavement, and then he was kneeling in front of her. “Breathe, baby,” he said, reaching out to hold her shoulders. His hands were big and warm, the touch of them achingly familiar. “It’s okay.”

“It isn’t,” Rey said, bursting into tears. “You’re not real. I’m going fucking nuts, and I’m going to blink, and you’ll be gone again, and I won’t be able to take it—”

“I’m real,” he said in that deep, melodic voice. “You’re not going nuts.”

Her hands moved without conscious thought, clenching in the soft fabric of his shirt. Oh, God, she could _smell_ him, the same woodsy scent that had saturated his hoodie for months after his death. “I can’t lose you again,” she choked out. “I can’t. I’ll die.”

“Rey, Rey.” His arms wrapped around her, and he brought her to his chest. “I’ll explain everything. But this is real. I’m here. You’re not going to lose me.” His voice was thick with tears.

Rey wept into his shirt. Her insides were a mess of adrenaline and confusion, ecstatic happiness mixing with bone-deep terror. She wanted him to be here so badly, but what if she really had snapped? What if she was all alone in the park right now, on her knees, hugging a ghost?

“Are you a ghost?” she asked, the thought sharp enough to penetrate through her tumultuous emotions. If he was, could they still have a relationship? She wasn’t sure of the logistics, but he felt solid enough. She’d never believed in ghosts, but then again, she’d never believed in Heaven, either. Or true love. Or soulmates.

“No, not a ghost. I’m alive, I promise. Here.” He shifted their position, pressing one hand to the back of her head to hold her ear to his chest. “Listen to my heartbeat.”

It was hard to hear anything past the buzzing in her ears, but Rey took a few deep breaths and listened. There it was, strong and steady. _Thump thump. Thump thump._ His chest rose and fell with his breathing. His body was warm and solid.

Rey pulled back enough to look up at him. She tracked every detail of his face—familiar, yet different in small ways. There were those plush lips she adored, the bold nose, the sprinkle of moles that made him so interesting to look at. He was thinner, though, his eyes shadowed. A scar slashed over the right side of his face from his forehead to his neck. “You’re real,” she said wonderingly. “I didn’t make you up.”

His honey-brown eyes, ringed with that circle of dark brown, darted over her face as if he, too, was cataloguing her features. “You’re real, too,” he said. “God, Rey, I’ve missed you so much.”

The words knocked loose a stray bit of sense, and Rey’s relief mixed with a surge of outrage. “What the fuck, Ben?” she asked, thumping him on the shoulder. “Where were you? Why did you let me think… let me think you were dead?” More tears spilled over. “I thought you were gone and I was all alone. It wrecked me.”

“I’m so sorry.” He was crying, too. “I never wanted to hurt you. It killed me, thinking about you mourning me. I wanted to tell you I was alive, but they wouldn’t let me. Not until now.”

“Who?” Rey asked. “Who wouldn’t let you?” Whoever it was, she was going to hunt them down and murder them slowly.

Ben took a deep breath. “Rey, I’ve been in the Witness Protection Program for the last year.”

\-----

They settled on a bench besides the butterfly bush. Rey listened with wide eyes while Ben told her the story.

“Han told Snoke he was getting out of smuggling,” he started. “And he let it slip that Mom knew about it, so Snoke decided he needed to take care of the situation before she went to the authorities. That’s what my dad wanted to tell me the night before our anniversary. That he’d fucked up, and Snoke might be after us, and we needed to be careful. He was going to tell Mom, too, but she was at the store when he got home.”

Ben started shaking. “I was so angry with him. I shouted at him, said the most horrible things. That he was a deadbeat and a criminal, a shitty person, the worst father. I accused him of putting his family in danger, of putting _you_ in danger. I’ve never said such awful things in my life.” He started crying again, so Rey scooted towards him and wrapped her arms around him. He leaned into her touch, massive frame wracked with sobs. “And he just took it,” Ben said. “He took it and said he knew, and I was right. That he wasn’t the father or the man he should have been.”

Rey rubbed her hand over his heart, needing to soothe him. Ben had never had the easiest relationship with his father, and she couldn’t imagine how it had felt to be betrayed by the man who ought to have been a rock for his family. “I’m so sorry,” she whispered.

Ben took a deep breath and wiped his nose with the back of his hand. “I shouldn’t have been so cruel. I should have forgiven him. Told him I still loved him.”

“You’re human, Ben. And he knew you loved him. Love doesn’t go away just because you’re angry with someone.”

He squeezed his eyes shut. “Sometimes I think… if we hadn’t been having that fight, would we have heard it? Would we have been ready?”

Dread settled in Rey’s stomach. “Ready for what?”

“Snoke and his men.” Ben shuddered. “They broke in, dressed head-to-toe in black. Masks and gloves. They…” He swallowed hard. “They tied me up, made me watch as they beat him. Then made him watch as they beat me.”

“Oh, darling.” Rey squeezed him tighter. “That’s awful.”

“I kept screaming at them to stop, but they… they just laughed.” His voice broke. “One of them had a knife. He said he was going to cut me up into little pieces and feed me to his dogs. Dad was shouting, begging them to stop, promising he’d do anything. He told them to kill him and let me live.” He let out a choking sob. “After I’d yelled at him, been so awful, he was willing to die for me.”

“Oh, baby. He was your father. Of course he was willing to do that.” Rey didn’t have much practical experience with families, but wanting one so desperately had made her somewhat of an expert in them. She’d read everything she could get her hands on, studied her friends’ families with fascination. If there was one thing she knew, it was that a man like Han, no matter how much he’d failed his family in other ways, wouldn’t hesitate to give up his life for the people he loved.

Ben sniffled. “I still have nightmares about it. The blood and the screaming. And the laughter.” He ran a finger down his face, outlining the scar. “They gave me this, and others on my arms and my chest. I didn’t care. All I wanted was to get Dad out of there. But in the end I… I couldn’t.”

Rey rocked him gently. She could barely move his huge torso, but she needed to soothe him somehow. She hummed gently under her breath.

“They decided they were wasting too much time,” Ben said. “They’d wanted Mom there so they could kill her, too, but she hadn’t come back yet, thank fuck.” He made a pained noise deep in his chest. “So they doused the house in an accelerant and set it on fire.”

Rey gasped. “With the two of you still tied up?”

“I watched him die,” Ben said, voice breaking. “I told him I loved him, but I don’t even know if he heard. The flames were so loud—I didn’t know they’d be so loud. And the screaming…” He broke down, sobbing and shaking violently.

“Shh, baby. I’m here.” Rey clung to him, trying to be his anchor in the storm. For all that she had suffered the last year, what Ben was describing was a vision of Hell.

His face was a mess of snot and tears. “We were on opposite sides of the room. I don’t know if I just got lucky or if they fucked up with the accelerant, but I lasted a little longer. I passed out from the smoke. When I woke up, I was in an ambulance. The firefighters had gotten there and found me unconscious. They saved me, but Dad…”

“Oh, honey.” Rey climbed into his lap, needing more contact. She cupped his cheeks, holding his watery gaze. “I’m so sorry. I can’t imagine going through that.”

“I lost time,” he said. “In the hospital. It was like… I was awake, but I wasn’t aware, you know? Like I was living outside my body.” His hands settled on her waist, stroking up and down. “The psychologist said it was a trauma response, that it would get better with time. And it has, but it still happens sometimes. Something will remind me—a sound or just a feeling—and I’ll just… go away for a bit.”

“I understand.” She leaned in and kissed his forehead. “I’ll be here for you whenever that happens. I’ll be your anchor.”

“You were my anchor,” he said. “In the hospital, and after. They didn’t let anyone see me at first. Eventually they let Mom in, but it was a special case because of her status, and she had to sign so much shit saying she wouldn’t tell anyone I was alive. I was so confused at first. Why weren’t you there? Why did they keep talking about me like I was supposed to be dead?”

“I wish I had been there,” Rey said. “God, I wish it so much.”

“Me, too.” His fingers flexed on her sides. “Eventually, I was well enough for the federal agents to talk to me. They’d been building a case against Snoke and knew my testimony would seal the deal. But since Snoke and his men thought I was dead, they needed to keep me that way so he didn’t try to kill me again before the trial. They enrolled me in the Witness Protection Program, moved me to fucking Montana under armed guard, gave me a new name.” He scoffed. “Kylo Ren, if you’ll believe it. Ridiculous.”

“I like Ben better,” Rey admitted. She stroked his cheek, tracing the scar. “But I’d love you under any name.”

“God, Rey.” He clutched her close and buried his face in her hair. “I told them you were safe, that you could be trusted. I wanted you to know I was alive so badly. But all they saw was a girlfriend I’d only been with for a year. They flat-out refused.”

“Fucking bastards,” Rey said.

“They didn’t understand.” Ben nuzzled her ear. “Our connection. How important it is.”

How could anyone understand the pull of something this strong? They were one soul in two bodies, twin hearts beating in time. “So you were the mystery witness,” Rey marveled. “I read about it in the papers a bit. Not too much, because it hurt to think about you, but when I wanted to know more.” Snoke’s trial had been secretive, but the newspapers reported a surprise witness who had survived Snoke’s attempt on his life. Rey had been glad that someone, at least, had escaped that monster’s clutches. She’d just never guessed it was Ben.

“It was awful,” Ben said. “Just hearing his voice again sent me into a depressive spiral that lasted weeks. But I knew I needed to see this through. Make the world a safer place.” His exhale rustled the flower tucked in her hair. “I never wanted him to be able to hurt you.”

“You did good, sweetheart. You did so good.” Rey rested against him, running her hands through his hair and over his face and neck, fingertips absorbing the feel of him. “I missed you so much,” she whispered. “And I’m so happy you’re back.”

“Yeah?” Ben drew back to look at her. “I was worried maybe you’d moved on. I stalked your Instagram like a crazy person, but you barely posted anything.”

“Because I was barely living,” Rey confessed. “I didn’t know how to go on without you.”

“I’m sorry,” Ben whispered.

Rey shook her head. “Don’t be. You kept me safe. You kept yourself safe. And now Snoke’s in prison.” Her lips trembled as she smiled. “We can be together again.”

His face was blotchy and wet from crying, but when he smiled, he was the most beautiful thing she had ever seen. 

“I haven’t kissed you yet,” she said, abruptly realizing the lack. “Can I?”

He nodded eagerly. “Please, Rey.”

She leaned in and pressed her lips against his, and it was like coming home. His mouth was soft, the gentle movements familiar. He tasted salty from his tears, and Rey set out to kiss them all away. The past year had been a living nightmare for both of them, but it was finally over. They were waking up together.

Much later, they paused for breath. Ben rested his forehead against hers. “I’m never leaving your side again,” he vowed.

“Me, neither.” A thought occurred to Rey. “How did you find me here?”

“I tried the garage and then your apartment, but you weren’t there, so I stopped by Maz’s to ask if she’d seen you. She told me about the date, and I knew where you’d go next.” His huffed laugh brushed across her lips like a spring breeze. “Did you really order my photo a salad?”

Rey giggled and sat up, swiping at the tears under her eyes. “Shut up. You know your ghost would have loved that shit.”

He chuckled. “Not just my ghost. It’s the sweetest fucking thing in the world. Even if it's a waste of perfectly good spinach.” He looked to the side, where Rey had left his photo on the bench. “Oh, no, it’s that one.” He grimaced. “My ears look huge in that.”

“Oh, stop it. Your ears are perfect. Very noble.” She traced them with her fingertips. “Just the right size.”

“For what?” Ben asked.

“Kissing.” She leaned in and nibbled her way down one of them, loving his startled laugh and the way it melted into a sigh.

“We’re finally having our anniversary date,” she murmured. “After all this time.”

Ben shifted her off him, then stood up and held out his hand. “Come on. Let’s do this right.”

Rey smiled and slipped her fingers into his, letting him tug her off the bench. Hand-in-hand, they walked down the path together.

\-----

For the rest of the afternoon, they retraced Rey’s steps, stopping first at the Klimt exhibit. There, Ben did a very passionate reenactment of "The Kiss," much to the delight of the other patrons. Rey’s cheeks flushed as applause and whoops filled the air. She couldn’t stop smiling.

Next, they went to Maz’s for an early dinner. Rey ordered a cheeseburger, even though she knew she wouldn’t be able to finish the whole thing so soon after her last one. Ben, of course, ordered a pretentious salad. Maz brought them their usual drinks, her eyes bright with tears behind her thick glasses.

“To us,” Rey said, raising her glass in a toast.

Ben clinked it with his tumbler of whiskey. “To us.”

Ben’s apartment had been sold, his belongings packed away to Leia’s house to maintain the illusion that he was dead, so they headed to Rey’s place next. The sky was blurring into streaks of red and purple by the time they arrived at the building. Rey held his hand during the creaky elevator ride up to her fourth floor studio apartment.

Her hands trembled as she unlocked the door. He hadn’t been here for more than a year. What would he think?

She was silent while he explored the space, investigating the knick-knacks on her desk, then examining the wall full of photos over her bed. He turned to her, eyes sad. “You never took these down.”

Rey shook her head. “I couldn’t. I added more, too. See?” She pointed out the photos she’d printed from Facebook: Ben reading a book, Ben feeding the ducks at the university lake, the two of them playing a heated game of chess.

He slid an arm around her and pressed his lips to her head. “I’m sorry I made you wait.”

“I’d do it all over again to end up like this,” Rey said. “I’d wait a thousand years for you.”

“Unless we’re both vampires, that’s not going to work out well.”

“Hush.” She punched his arm lightly. “What about those parallel universes? All those other timelines where we end up happily ever after? You know nothing can keep us apart.”

“True.” His lips curved as he leaned down to steal a kiss from her. “You’re my destiny, Rey.”

As the last sliver of sun disappeared from the horizon, Rey pulled out his record player from under her desk and put on the Jimmy Durante record. As the strains of “I’ll Be Seeing You” filtered through the air, she wrapped her arms around his neck. “Dance with me, baby.”

They swayed to the music, turning in slow circles. The world narrowed to one small room and the feel of two souls reunited after too long apart. 

_I'll find you in the morning sun  
_ _And when the night is new  
_ _I'll be looking at the moon  
_ _But I'll be seeing you_

Ben kissed her when the song died away. The record ended, but neither of them moved to lift the needle and turn the record player off. The faint _pop pop pop_ from the still-spinning record dropped into the silence like raindrops.

The kiss was slow at first, a gentle exploration of each other’s mouths. It was as if, having rediscovered something so precious, both of them were afraid of being too rough with it. But then Ben licked at Rey’s lips, and she parted them with a sigh, and the contact deepened and intensified.

Rey walked backwards towards her bed, dragging him with her, lips still fused to his. They only broke apart when he pushed her down onto the bed. She reached for him, but he shook his head and stood beside her, looking down. “You kept the hoodie,” he said, trailing a finger down her sternum.

“I sleep in it every night.” She started to sit up. “Do you want it back?”

He pressed her back down. “No, no. It’s yours now.”

Rey relaxed. “Good. But do you think…”

“What?”

“Do you think you could wear it sometimes? To make it smell like you again?” The day she'd realized it no longer smelled like him, she'd wept in her shower for an hour.

His face softened. “Oh, baby, of course.” Then his lips quirked. “I’ll be sure to rub it in my armpits every time I go for a run.”

She giggled. “You know, I don’t even think I’d mind.”

His fingers closed on the silver zipper. He tugged it down, working past the part where it always stuck. It was like no time had passed at all. Even if the mind faltered, the body remembered.

He spread the two halves, revealing her yellow sundress. “Off,” he said, snapping one of the straps.

Rey sat up and shucked off the hoodie, dropping it by the side of the bed. She didn’t need to treat it like a ritual object anymore, not now that Ben himself was here in the flesh. The dress followed, leaving her in nothing but her underwear.

Ben groaned at the sight of her bare breasts. “Have I ever told you how much I love the fact you rarely wear bras?”

“Only about a million times,” she said. She nodded at his clothes. “Your turn.”

He stripped rapidly, tossing his T-shirt aside. There were new scars on his torso, and the line bisecting his face went all the way down to his pectoral. She grieved internally at this reminder of what he'd been through. Later tonight, she would kiss each and every scar, whispering her love to those marks of pain.  
  
Ben nearly stumbled as he tried to get out of his jeans and socks. His black boxer-briefs were next. Rey made a delighted noise at the sight of his hard cock. “I’ve missed this,” she said, crawling towards him. She wrapped her hands around the firm, flushed length of him and stroked.

He tangled his fingers in her hair. “Just that?” he asked, sounding breathless.

Rey mock-glared at him. “Don’t be a brat.” She leaned in and swirled her tongue around the fleshy cap, and Ben groaned loudly.

“You’re going to kill me,” he said.

In response, Rey opened her mouth to take in the entire tip. She hummed as she sucked lightly, bobbing her head to take a little more of him each time. He was incredibly hard, his thick shaft stretching her lips wide. She took in the salty, musky flavor of his skin, rejoicing at having the taste of him in her mouth again. She’d always loved this—the heat of it, the wet glide, the way Ben grunted and moaned above her. She loved the way it felt like a gift.

“That’s it,” Ben said, pulling out of her mouth. “I refuse to go another second without tasting you.” He pushed her back onto the bed and climbed in next to her, then tapped his lips. “Sit on my face.” Rey shook her head, giggling when he pouted. “Why not?” he asked plaintively.

“Because I have a better idea.” She swung a leg over his face, facing backwards so she had access to his cock.

Ben caught on instantly. He grabbed her hips and tugged her down to his mouth. Rey gasped at the first stroke of his tongue over her clit. She hastily lowered herself until she could wrap her mouth around his cock again.

They worked together, licking and sucking as the need rose to a fever pitch. It wasn’t elegant; this was raw and urgent, a mutual devouring. Ben’s tongue and lips were everywhere, tracing the intimate contours of her body, and the pleasure built rapidly. Rey hadn’t masturbated in a year, unable to grant herself that sort of pleasure when the man she wanted to give it to her was gone. She was going to come soon, but she didn’t want it to be like this. She wanted to look in his eyes while she fell apart.

She tried to get off him, but he made a noise of denial and held her hips tightly. “Ben!” she gasped as he attacked her clit with new fervor. “In me, please, I want it when you’re in me—”

He stopped sucking and shifted her off him, then flipped her onto her back. She loved the way he manhandled her, like she weighed nothing at all. He settled in the cradle of her thighs, cock pressed against her soaking wet pussy. “Now?” he asked. His eyes were wild, his hair mussed, his lips rosy and slick from eating her out.

Rey nodded, wrapping her arms around his neck. “Now, please.”

A shudder went through him. He lifted up slightly, then grabbed his cock and fitted it against her. He started pushing, and Rey sighed as her flesh parted around him. The stretch was good and right and familiar—pleasure with just an edge of discomfort. He went slowly, sinking into her inch by inch, until finally his hips were flush against hers. Rey’s inner walls were stretched tight around him, and the throb of her heartbeat echoed everywhere they touched.

“All right?” he asked.

“It’s been a while,” she confessed, cataloguing the deep ache. She squeezed him lightly with her inner muscles. “Fuck, you’re big.”

A rakish grin appeared on his full lips. “Don’t tell me you forgot,” he teased.

A pang went through her heart. She was happier than she’d ever been, complete at last, but it was impossible to forget how close she’d come to losing her other half forever. “I could never forget anything about you,” she whispered.

“Me, neither. Your name is written on my heart.” Ben’s lips stroked gently over hers. He tasted like her, an earthy tang that gave the moment depth. This was _real._ The kiss was sweet, hardly matching the carnal reality of his body buried deep inside her own, but it contained an unspoken promise. _You. Me. Forever._

It shook Rey to the core.

“Now,” she told him. “Make love to me.”

He drew out partway, then pushed back in. It was a slow, heavenly glide, and Rey moaned at the sensation of being filled all over again. She dropped her hands to his ass to feel the roll of his hips and the clenching of his buttocks when he thrust as deep as he could go. She was a vessel for their mutual need, filling and emptying over and over, and he labored over her so carefully, using his entire body to bring her pleasure. His lips traced over her temple; his hand cupped her bottom to tip her hips up.

Rey gasped when the new angle hit that spot deep inside her only Ben had ever been able to reach. “Yes,” she said, clutching his ass tighter. “Right there.”

Ben kept up his firm, even rhythm, although she could tell from his ragged breathing that he was struggling to hang on. “Been a while,” he said. “Not going to last.”

“Me, neither.” Rey worked her hips against him, aiding his rhythm. They were wedged tightly together, touching everywhere possible. His hair-coarsened skin rubbed against her, and the pressure of his pubic bone on her clit made her body sing. Heat built in her lower belly, along with an unbearably sweet tension. “Yes, yes, yes,” she gasped. Her head thrashed on the pillow. She was climbing towards the peak, body gearing up for an explosive climax.

Ben grunted and sped up. Their bodies slapped together, the noise loud and lewd. Then a flush of shivering heat spread over Rey’s body, and she cried out as her pussy clenched around him in rhythmic pulses. The orgasm burst over her like a star going nova, and she clung to him as pleasure shook through her.

He groaned and buried himself inside her one final time. His body jerked as he came, and his face was screwed up in an expression of anguished bliss that matched her own.

When it was over, he slumped on top of her, burying his face in her neck. Rey held him, stroking her hand through his sweaty hair and up and down his back. He was heavy, crushing her into the bed, but she liked it. It was more proof that he was here. That this was real.

A hot burst of air puffed over her skin as Ben sighed. Then he groaned and turned onto his side to lie next to her. His softening cock slipped out of her body, leaving her wet and empty. She immediately reached for him, cuddling as close as she could get. She pressed her ear against his chest, listening to the rapid patter of his heartbeat.

They lay there peacefully for a long while. Rey listened to the soft _pop pop pop_ of the record player in the background. Outside, a car honked. Her breathing slowed to match Ben’s, and the synchronized rush of air was the only other sound that disturbed the stillness.

“I’m glad you’re back,” she finally said. The words were insufficient to express the magnitude of gratitude and joy filling her, but she offered them anyway. Today may have been their second anniversary, but it was also a new beginning. The first step towards a future so wondrous, she could only imagine it in pieces.

The sound of a wedding march. The soft skin of a newborn. Road trips and home-cooked meals and reading books together on rainy days. And, more than anything, Ben’s smile, a constant comfort as their bodies grew wrinkled and old.

She wouldn’t mind being wrinkled. Not if he was by her side.

Ben squeezed her tightly. “Yeah,” he said, voice rough. “Me, too.”

**Author's Note:**

> ["Pissarro’s "The Boulevard Montmartre at Night"](https://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/media/28268/n-4119-00-000024-hd.jpg)
> 
> [Edvard Munch's "The Sun"](https://www.edvardmunch.org/images/paintings/sun.jpg)
> 
> [Gustav Klimt's "The Kiss"](https://www.gustav-klimt.com/images/paintings/The-Kiss.jpg)
> 
> I couldn't resist tossing in one of my own favorite songs I listen to when I want a cry. ["I'll Be Seeing You" by Jimmy Durante](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uSzmuWImK7Q).
> 
> I hope you liked that! If you did, please let me know in the comments.


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